Interplay of classical noise sources in the relaxation oscillations of an Nd:YAG laser

We present an investigation of fluctuations in the start-up of a single-mode, continuous wave, Nd:YAG laser that result from the interplay of classical pump and loss rate noise. We show that the timescale of the classical fluctuations is a key factor in determining the main structural features of relaxation oscillation ensembles. We find that long-timescale pump rate fluctuations are the primary factor determining the timing jitter of the first intensity spike, but that short-timescale loss rate fluctuations are necessary to match the sloping of the peaks of corresponding intensity spikes in an ensemble.     

Preparation and relaxation of very stable glassy states of a simulated liquid

We prepare metastable glassy states in a model glass former made of Lennard-Jones particles by sampling biased ensembles of trajectories with low dynamical activity. These trajectories form an inactive dynamical phase whose "fast" vibrational degrees of freedom are maintained at thermal equilibrium by contact with a heat bath, while the "slow" structural degrees of freedom are located in deep valleys of the energy landscape. We examine the relaxation to equilibrium and the vibrational properties of these metastable states. The glassy states we prepare by our trajectory sampling method are very stable to thermal fluctuations and also more mechanically rigid than low-temperature equilibrated configurations.     

Exact uncertainty approach in quantum mechanics and quantum gravity

The assumption that an ensemble of classical particles is subject to nonclassical momentum fluctuations, with the fluctuation uncertainty fully determined by the position uncertainty, has been shown to lead from the classical equations of motion to the Schrödinger equation. This ‘exact uncertainty’ approach may be generalised to ensembles of gravitational fields, where nonclassical fluctuations are added to the field momentum densities, of a magnitude determined by the uncertainty in the metric tensor components. In this way one obtains the Wheeler-DeWitt equation of quantum gravity, with the added bonus of a uniquely specified operator ordering. No a priori assumptions are required concerning the existence of wave functions, Hilbert spaces, Planck's constant, linear operators, etc. Thus this approach has greater transparency than the usual canonical approach, particularly in regard to the connections between quantum and classical ensembles. Conceptual foundations and advantages are emphasised.     

Activity driven adaptive stochastic resonance

Cortical neurons in vivo show fluctuations in their membrane potential of the order of several milli-volts. Using simple and biophysically realistic models of a single neuron we demonstrate that noise induced fluctuations can be used to adaptively optimize the sensitivity of the neuron's output to ensembles of subthreshold inputs of different average strengths. Optimal information transfer is achieved by changing the strength of the noise such that the neuron's average firing rate remains constant. Adaptation is fast, because only crude estimates of the output rate are required at any time.     

Bayesian ensemble approach to error estimation of interatomic potentials

Using a Bayesian approach a general method is developed to assess error bars on predictions made by models fitted to data. The error bars are estimated from fluctuations in ensembles of models sampling the model-parameter space with a probability density set by the minimum cost. The method is applied to the development of interatomic potentials for molybdenum using various potential forms and databases based on atomic forces. The calculated error bars on elastic constants, gamma-surface energies, structural energies, and dislocation properties are shown to provide realistic estimates of the actual errors for the potentials.     

Nonuniform ensembles of diverse resonances in one-dimensional layered media

The transmission spectra perform huge fluctuations even in the mostly suitable one-dimensional localized multilayer system. Fluctuations of layer thicknesses will cause random resonances between light waves and layers. We reveal that the nonuniform ensembles of the resonances are the key for the fluctuations of transmission spectra. The transmission spectra of each stack of layers are numerically calculated through the transfer-matrix method.     

Mesoscopic systems with fixed number of electrons

In this paper, we study the physics of mesoscopic systems with noninteracting electrons of fixed number. From a technical point of view, this means a discussion of the differences between the canonical and the grand canonical ensemble (fixed versus fluctuating number of particles). Such a discussion is not trivial since the grand canonical ensemble is the most convenient basis for the statistics of identical particles and one has to spend labour in order to retrieve the canonical ensemble. Specifically, we are considering ensembles of mesoscopic systems with disorder, either by atomic defects or by fluctuations in their geometric definitions and we discuss various forms of disorder averages.     

Thermodynamic theory of equilibrium fluctuations

The postulational basis of classical thermodynamics has been expanded to incorporate equilibrium fluctuations. The main additional elements of the proposed thermodynamic theory are the concept of quasi-equilibrium states, a definition of non-equilibrium entropy, a fundamental equation of state in the entropy representation, and a fluctuation postulate describing the probability distribution of macroscopic parameters of an isolated system. Although these elements introduce a statistical component that does not exist in classical thermodynamics, the logical structure of the theory is different from that of statistical mechanics and represents an expanded version of thermodynamics. Based on this theory, we present a regular procedure for calculations of equilibrium fluctuations of extensive parameters, intensive parameters and densities in systems with any number of fluctuating parameters. The proposed fluctuation formalism is demonstrated by four applications: (1) derivation of the complete set of fluctuation relations for a simple fluid in three different ensembles; (2) fluctuations in finite-reservoir systems interpolating between the canonical and micro-canonical ensembles; (3) derivation of fluctuation relations for excess properties of grain boundaries in binary solid solutions, and (4) derivation of the grain boundary width distribution for pre-melted grain boundaries in alloys. The last two applications offer an efficient fluctuation-based approach to calculations of interface excess properties and extraction of the disjoining potential in pre-melted grain boundaries. Possible future extensions of the theory are outlined.     

Density Matrix in Quantum Mechanics and Distinctness of Ensembles Having the Same Compressed Density Matrix

We clarify different definitions of the density matrix by proposing the use of different names, the full density matrix for a single-closed quantum system, the compressed density matrix for the averaged single molecule state from an ensemble of molecules, and the reduced density matrix for a part of an entangled quantum system, respectively. We show that ensembles with the same compressed density matrix can be physically distinguished by observing fluctuations of various observables. This is in contrast to a general belief that ensembles with the same compressed density matrix are identical. Explicit expression for the fluctuation of an observable in a specified ensemble is given. We have discussed the nature of nuclear magnetic resonance quantum computing. We show that the conclusion that there is no quantum entanglement in the current nuclear magnetic resonance quantum computing experiment is based on the unjustified belief that ensembles having the same compressed density matrix are identical physically. Related issues in quantum communication are also discussed.     

Entropic Formulation of Statistical Mechanics

We present an alternative formulation of Equilibrium Statistical Mechanics which follows the method based on the maximum statistical entropy principle in Information Theory combined with the use of Massieu–Planck functions. The different statistical ensembles are obtained by a suitable restriction of the whole set of available microstates. The main advantage is that all of the equations that relate the average values with derivatives of the partition function are formally identical in the different ensembles. Moreover, Einstein's fluctuation formula is also derived within the same framework. This provides a suitable starting point for the calculation of fluctuations of extensive and intensive variables in any statistical ensemble.     

Multi-Scale Jacobi Method for Anderson Localization

We prove that the fluctuations of mesoscopic linear statistics for orthogonal polynomial ensembles are universal in the sense that two measures with asymptotic recurrence coefficients have the same asymptotic mesoscopic fluctuations (under an additional assumption on the local regularity of one of the measures). The convergence rate of the recurrence coefficients determines the range of scales on which the limiting fluctuations are identical. Our main tool is an analysis of the Green’s function for the associated Jacobi matrices.As a particular consequencewe obtain a central limit theorem for the modified Jacobi Unitary Ensembles on all mesoscopic scales.     

Spectral fluctuations and 1/f noise in the order-chaos transition regime

Level fluctuations in a quantum system have been used to characterize quantum chaos using random matrix models. Recently time series methods were used to relate the level fluctuations to the classical dynamics in the regular and chaotic limit. In this, we show that the spectrum of the system undergoing order to chaos transition displays a characteristic f(-gamma) noise and gamma is correlated with the classical chaos in the system. We demonstrate this using a smooth potential and a time-dependent system modeled by Gaussian and circular ensembles, respectively, of random matrix theory. We show the effect of short periodic orbits on these fluctuation measures.     

Increase in the coercivity of an ensemble of (DyPr)–(CoFe)–B microparticles during their dispersion in a polymer matrix

In ensembles of annealed ferrimagnetic alloy (DyPr)–(CoFe)–B microparticles in the free state and fixed in polymer, the coercivity differs more than by an order of magnitude. The contributions of orientation locking of magnetic axes of particles and the dipole magnetic interaction between particles to the coercivity and saturation magnetization field of an ensemble are discussed. In ensembles of unannealed microparticles, the effect of their locking and dispersing in polymer is significantly weaker.     

Wave function structure in two-body random matrix ensembles

We study the structure of eigenstates in two-body interaction random matrix ensembles and find significant deviations from random matrix theory expectations. The deviations are most prominent in the tails of the spectral density and indicate localization of the eigenstates in Fock space. Using ideas related to scar theory we derive an analytical formula that relates fluctuations in wave function intensities to fluctuations of the two-body interaction matrix elements. Numerical results for many-body fermion systems agree well with the theoretical predictions.     

Gibbs ensembles in relativistic classical and quantum mechanics

Classical and quantum Gibbs ensembles are constructed for equilibrium statistical mechanics in the framework of an extension to many-body theory of a relativistic mechanics proposed by Stueckelberg. In addition to the usual chemical potential in the grand canonical ensemble, there is a new potential corresponding to the mass degree of freedom of relativistic systems. It is shown that in the nonrelativistic limit the relativistic ensembles we have obtained reduce to the usual ones, and mass fluctuations for the free-particle gas approach the fluctuations in N. The ultrarelativistic limit of the canonical ensemble for the free-particle gas differs from the corresponding limit of the ensemble proposed by Jüttner and Pauli. Due to the mass degree of freedom, the quantum counting of states is different from that of the nonrelativistic theory. If the mass distribution is sufficiently sharp, the thermodynamical effects of this multiplicity will not be large. There may, however, be detectable effects such as a shift in the Fermi level and the critical temperature for Bose-Einstein condensation, and some change in specific heats.     

Persistent non-ergodic fluctuations in mesoscopic insulators: The NSS model in the unitary and symplectic ensembles

We give a detailed picture of the mesoscopic conductance fluctuations in the deep insulating regime (DIR) within the Nguyen, Spivak and Shklovskii model in the unitary and symplectic ensembles. Slutski's theorem is invoked to rigorously state the ergodic problem for conductance fluctuations in the DIR, in contrast with previous studies. A weakly decaying behavior of the log-conductance correlation function, even weaker when spin-orbit scatterers are included, is established on the relevant field scale of the model. Such a slow decay implies that the stochastic process, defined by the fluctuations of the log-conductance, is non-ergodic in the mean square sense in the ensembles with the reported symmetries. The results can be interpreted in terms of the effective number of samples within the available magnetic scale. Using the replica approach, we derive the strong localisation counterparts of the well known 'cooperon' and 'diffuson' which permit analyzing quantitatively the decaying behavior of the correlation function and reveal its symmetry related properties in agreement with the numerical results. Received 11 April 2002 / Received in final form 27 August 2002 Published online 19 November 2002     

Collective phase chaos in the dynamics of interacting oscillator ensembles

We study the chaotic behavior of order parameters in two coupled ensembles of self-sustained oscillators. Coupling within each of these ensembles is switched on and off alternately, while the mutual interaction between these two subsystems is arranged through quadratic nonlinear coupling. We show numerically that in the course of alternating Kuramoto transitions to synchrony and back to asynchrony, the exchange of excitations between two subpopulations proceeds in such a way that their collective phases are governed by an expanding circle map similar to the Bernoulli map. We perform the Lyapunov analysis of the dynamics and discuss finite-size effects.     

Statistical properties of many-particle spectra. IV. New ensembles by Stieltjes transform methods

New Gaussian matrix ensembles, with arbitrary centroids and variances for the matrix elements, are defined as modifications of the three standard ones—GOE, GUE and GSE. The average density and two-point correlation function are given in the general case in terms of the corresponding Stieltjes transforms, first used by Pastur for the density. It is shown for the centroid-modified ensemble K + αH that when the operator K preserves the underlying symmetries of the standard ensemble H, then, as the magnitude of α grows, the transition of the fluctuations to those of H is very rapid and discontinuous in the limit of asymptotic dimensionality. Corresponding results are found for other ensembles. A similar Dyson result for the effects of the breaking of a model symmetry on the fluctuations is generalized to any model symmetry, as well as to the fundamental symmetries such as time-reversal invariance.     

Non-equivalence of Dynamical Ensembles and Emergent Non-ergodicity

Dynamical ensembles have been introduced to study constrained stochastic processes. In the microcanonical ensemble, the value of a dynamical observable is constrained to a given value. In the canonical ensemble a bias is introduced in the process to move the mean value of this observable. The equivalence between the two ensembles means that calculations in one or the other ensemble lead to the same result. In this paper, we study the physical conditions associated with ensemble equivalence and the consequences of non-equivalence. For continuous time Markov jump processes, we show that ergodicity guarantees ensemble equivalence. For non-ergodic systems or systems with emergent ergodicity breaking, we adapt a method developed for equilibrium ensembles to compute asymptotic probabilities while caring about the initial condition. We illustrate our results on the infinite range Ising model by characterizing the fluctuations of magnetization and activity. We discuss the emergence of non-ergodicity by showing that the initial condition can only be forgotten after a time that scales exponentially with the number of spins.

     

Protein structural change upon ligand binding: linear response theory

A simple formula based on linear response theory is proposed to explain and predict the structural change of proteins upon ligand binding. By regarding ligand binding as an external perturbation, the structural change as a response is described by atomic fluctuations in the ligand-free form and the protein-ligand interactions. The results for three protein systems of various sizes are consistent with the observations in the crystal structures, confirming the validity of the linear relationship between the equilibrium fluctuations and the structural change upon ligand binding.